For a while now, I’ve been of the opinion that golf instruction will be driven to change by the explosion of technology that has taken place over the last decade. The internet has become so pervasive and multimedia capability is in within the grasp of virtually anyone with a smart phone, laptop, or inexpensive video recorder. We can stream video and even chat face to face.

Certainly there are many pros that are taking advantage of technology, with video lessons being commonplace and with some pros even working in a web-friendly way. But, to me, there is still an awful lot of room for improvement.

Needless to say, I was enthused when I was contacted by Brant Kasbohm, director of instruction at FixYourGame.com and he asked me if I wanted to give his service a try. Kasbohm has been a PGA Professional since 2000. Click here to read his bio.

How It Works

Here’s how it works: you go out to the driving range and take two videos of your swing, one face-on, and one down-the-line. Simply hit five or six shots from each angle. From there, you go to the website, fill out a form, upload the videos (or provide links), and buy the lesson(s). Within 48 hours, you’ll receive a personalized golf lesson consisting of text and video analysis.

It really is that easy. Here are the two swing videos I uploaded that were used to build my lesson.

First, the face-on view:

And, the down-the-line view:

And here is the personalized instruction video that was provided back to me:

Along with the video, I was provided with an extensive written lesson that accompanied it. It’s too long to include here, but it’s a good complement to the video. It includes detailed description of the important concepts, along with a bunch of example videos recorded by Brant Kasbohm that demonstrate the techniques that are relevant to my custom lesson.

My Impressions

I’m of the opinion that face-to-face lessons will never go extinct. At least not until I can easily stream live, multi-angle video to my pro live from the range. Even though it’s possible to see most, if not all, of what needs to be seen to give an effective lesson, there’s the issue of the immediate feedback provided by a pro standing on the range as I hit shots.

That aside, I’m pretty impressed with the service that FixYourGame.com provides and there is definitely benefit to those who choose to go this route.

First, the price is excellent. For $19.95 per lesson (or $29.95 and $49.95 for a series of two and five lessons), it’s much more affordable than the $35-$150 that you’re going to pay a pro to stand there with you on the range. And you’re getting instruction from an actual PGA Professional. Special offer for Life in the Rough readers: mention that you were referred by Life in the Rough, buy one lesson, and get a second for free.

Also, the lesson was comprehensive.  The swing issues that were identified are valid, and the corrections were easy to understand. The video analysis was quite helpful and the linked video tips from the text portion of the lesson were an excellent complement.

The service does have some advantages over traditional range lessons. For instance, you do things at your own pace. Take video whenever you feel like it, and there are no appointments with pros to make or keep. Another benefit is, the lesson remains online for you to review at your leisure. Personally, that’s a benefit that can’t be understated. I often have trouble recalling things from recent lessons because the information fades over time. With this service you can refer back to it whenever you like.

Overall, I like the service a lot. It works well and Brant Kasbohm provided an excellent lesson from my videos. Personally, I will continue to do face-to-face lessons because I feel like I respond better to the instant feedback. But FixYourGame.com is great if you don’t want to pay the price of traditional lessons or if you want a PGA professional to have a look at your swing as a quick check-up, or if you just don’t want to do face-to-face lessons for some reason. Best of all, there’s a 100% money-back guarantee, if you don’t improve.

I had a good experience and I recommend giving it a try, especially if you’ve been put off by the cost of traditional lessons.

For more information, visit FixYourGame.com. Don’t forget, as a special offer for Life in the Rough readers, FixYourGame.com has offered a two-for-one deal. Mention that you were referred by Life in the Rough, purchase one lesson, and you’ll receive a second one free.

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Disclosure:

I was provided with a complementary lesson for the purpose of this review.

© 2007-2011 Life in the Rough. All Rights Reserved.

Instruction Review: FixYourGame.com

You may not have heard of Knoodle because it’s fairly new, but it’s a pretty interesting place.  It’s stated goal is to be “a place where people who are bad at stuff go to get good at stuff, and people who are good at stuff go to help people who are bad at stuff.“  In other words, it matches up teacher and student, providing the tools for teachers to easily put together compelling instruction and a place for students to go to take advantage of it.

When I was asked to review the Golf Instruction Series by Josh Zander, naturally, I was interested in seeing what it was all about.

First a little background on Josh Zander.  According to his mini-bio at Knoodle, Zander is a:

“…Class A PGA Teaching Professional at Stanford University Golf Course and Presidio Golf Course. Josh is a member of the Golf Digest Magazine Pro Panel and contributes articles on a regular basis. In 2007, Josh was voted one of the top 20 teachers under the age of 40 in America, voted one of the best teachers in the State of California, and top ranked instructor in the San Francisco Bay Area by Golf Digest. Josh is currently a Titleist Leadership Advisory Staff Member.”

The Josh Zander golf instructional series consists of 14 video lessons on a variety of topics from hip turn to alignment to swing path and a number of others.

Going above the norm, the Knoodle framework adds some cool features to enhance the video experience.  Interestingly, each lesson includes a series of notes, very similar to a PowerPoint presentation.  They sit adjacent to the video and automatically advance as the video progresses to reinforce the video instruction.  All of the notes can be downloaded as Adobe Acrobat files which can be studied later.

In addition, there are mechanisms built in to the Knoodle interface to comment on the lessons, rate them, share them with others, or even communicate with the author.

One of the interesting features of Knoodle is that it lets the instructor set the price of the instruction.  In this case, the price of this video series is set at $10.

As far as the quality of the lessons, I was pretty impressed.  Josh Zander is an accomplished teacher and he presents the lessons in a very easy to understand way.  As I write this, I’ve watched about ten of the 14 lessons and I found them all very concise and informative.  They’ve all been under ten minutes so far, with most falling in the 4-6 minute range.

During the lessons, Zander presents a number of drills and uses a number of training aids while demonstrating the topics at hand.

I found the companion notes to be a nice feature that you don’t really find with most video lessons online.  They not only help to focus on the important points of the lessons, but being able to download them and refer to them later is a nice way to review the material and remember the key points without necessarily needing to review the entire video lesson again.  This might come in handy as you experiment at the driving range.  It’s a lot easier to refer to notes than to watch a video while standing on the practice tee.

One thing that should be noted is that these 14 lessons cover a wide array of topics, but should not be construed as a comprehensive lesson covering everything there is to know about the golf swing.  There are a wide array of topics, but the lessons are fairly focused and brief.

I was somewhat conflicted about the $10 price tag initially.  To be truthful, before I viewed the lessons, I had a hard time believing that the series could be worth it.  The main reason for that is that the internet has grown into such a spring of knowledge (some good, some not so good), but even in the golf world, there is a ton of instruction out there available for free.

After working my way through most of the lessons, though, I think I’ve kind of changed my mind on that.  Josh Zander is a quality instructor and the lessons are pretty well done.  They’re informative and will give you a lot of solid information.  I didn’t tally up the total running times for all the videos, but there has to easily be an hour worth of material.  I don’t know what Josh Zander charges for a lesson, but I have to believe you’d easily pay at least $100 for an hour’s worth of this material from a teaching professional of his caliber.

I have to say that, overall, I recommend checking out the series of lessons.  Players looking to improve will find a wealth of information to help get on the road to better golf.  Knoodle itself is a neat concept and it will be interesting to see it expand and grow over time.  For now, feel free to check out the Josh Zander golf instructional series by clicking here.

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Important Disclosure

As of the time of this writing, I am engaged in an advertising relationship with Knoodle, which you might notice as a big ad near the top of my sidebar.  It is not an affiliate relationship (where I make money if you buy something), nor do I make money for click-throughs.

When I was approached by Knoodle, I was asked about buying advertising and also about reviewing this lesson series.  Before I would accept the advertisement, I asked for assurance that there was no expectation on my review being steered a certain way as a tit-for-tat in exchange for advertising. I was informed that not only was an honest review encouraged, it was expected.

If not for this fact, I would have turned down the advertising revenue, because to me, honesty and integrity are too important to sell.  This is why you have never seen, and will never see, a sponsored post in this space as long as I continue to breathe.

I believe that I have given the instructional series an honest assessment.  Because this is the first time I have ever accepted money from a company for advertising whose product I subsequently reviewed, I wanted to make this relationship completely transparent.  I also want to give you my personal assurance that I have continued to do what I have done from day one.  Namely, to tell you what I think as honestly as I can.

© 2007-2011 Life in the Rough. All Rights Reserved.

Instruction Review: Knoodle Golf Instruction Series